Regimentation is a fault common to both English football codes, from the bump and grind of Twickenham's pack-led rugby mob to the robotic specialisation of Fabio Capello's humbled gang. So when another qualification campaign sparks up against Bulgaria the eye will fall not only on the personnel selected but the spirit and the style of their endeavours.

Isolationism shaped England's woeful efforts in South Africa. A blend of Italian rigidity and English stuffiness conspired to produce a wooden structure. A new religion has swept the top of the game but so far Capello has chosen not to sign up to it, staying true instead to a faith that even most of the elite Premier League teams have abandoned.

The European club champions – Internazionale – and both World Cup finalists, Spain and Holland, are the chief authors of the vogue, along with Germany, the most improved team in the international orbit, and Brazil, whose nerve failed them in a quarter-final defeat against the Dutch. When such a heavyweight cast of countries, clubs and coaches conclude that a 4‑2‑3-1 system is the most effective, then the stragglers face a choice. Conform or defy? Adapt or die?

Capello must be starting to feel that each word written about this England side is a poisoned memo aimed at him. Since the blowout in Bloemfontein, hostility to him has deepened, but so has the sense that the bigger failing is in the culture: the pinball style that values physical subjugation more highly than skills and possession. One way to escape this cycle is to impose a pattern of play that obliges greater sophistication and protects England's slow centre-halves with a defensive screen of the sort formed by Javier Zanetti and Esteban Cambiasso for Inter in last season's Champions League.

To cut to the chase, Martin Keown, the former Arsenal and England centre‑back, wrote this week: "Spain had two defensive midfielders in Sergio Busquets and Xabi Alonso and so did Holland with Mark van Bommel and Nigel de Jong so why are we so arrogant to think we don't have to do the same?"

For Germany it was Sami Khedira and Bastian Schweinsteiger; in Brazilian yellow prowled Gilberto Silva and Felipe Melo. Of the World Cup semi‑finalists only Uruguay – the sick man of South America, if England wear that pallor in Europe – took to the field in three flat lines. The new fashion is no panacea, of course. It will annoy the imperious Capello to be goaded with number games. But from the Champions League to the World Cup there is incontrovertible evidence that using six defensive outfield players in this manner liberates the two full-backs and the four designated attackers in a way that fits the speed and the counterattacking tendencies of the modern game.

Capello, below, flirted with change for 25 minutes of last month's friendly against Hungary. He started with Wayne Rooney as the lone striker, used Bobby Zamora and Rooney together for 15 minutes after half-time, then withdrew his best centre-forward and deployed Ashley Young and Adam Johnson either side of Zamora, with Steven Gerrard free and James Milner and Gareth Barry providing ballast.

In his book The Anatomy of England – A History in Ten Matches, Jonathan Wilson writes: "Capello has, over the course of his career, shown a rare willingness to mould tactics to the players available, and then jettison any player who fails to follow the tactical instructions."

The phrase that chimes is "the players available". Contrary to popular belief Capello is more free in the England job than he was at Real Madrid, where the players were mostly bought by the hierarchy. With the Football Association's largesse in his trousers Capello is at liberty to reject Tom Huddlestone and maintain a hazy view of Jack Rodwell.

Those two upwardly mobile midfielders are mentioned because they are two fresh candidates to fill the Busquets-Alonso roles in this qualifying campaign. Capello tested Huddlestone pre-World Cup and withdrew his interest. For this pair of qualifiers he preferred Michael Carrick: a non-playing passenger in South Africa. In England colours, admittedly, Huddlestone looked stretched and slow. For Spurs, though, he exudes elegance and strength.

James Milner and Gareth Barry are other contenders, given Owen Hargreaves's long absence. But is Capello working to the most productive team shape or applying his own clear ideas about which individuals should be in his squad? If those subjective judgments dominate, they fall down with Shaun Wright-Phillips, who is way below the standard required of an international-class winger.

The best speech Capello could make before the Bulgaria game would be to tell these demoralised England players they are about to come in from the wilderness to embrace ideas that have worked beautifully for Inter, Germany and Spain. Or he could keep flogging the dead horse of a "high tempo", direct play and a bulldog spirit.